PDA

View Full Version : The Pre-Premier League Era



Simon
July 8th, 2013, 1:14 PM
One for the older lads to answer...

What was it like in the pre-Premier League days? I only ask because I started getting into football in that first Premier League season when I was 7, so I and most other people on here have no real memory of what it was like to be a football fan in those early days.

Go ahead Beefy, you were already in your early 20s when the Premier League began, right?

wardy
July 8th, 2013, 5:48 PM
I don't think he had admitted to himself that he was going bald yet. He still hasn't.

Chris Scott
July 8th, 2013, 5:52 PM
I remember a tiny bit us winning the league in 1990 when I was 9. My uncle got me a season ticket the following season which I've had since and guess what?

MMH
July 8th, 2013, 6:29 PM
It was much more dirty and rural. But also kind of better but you had to be there at the time I think. You didnt have any big name foreigners playing but I think the best part of pre premier league football is every team had their own star player and all the teams had a chance of winning the league at various points. I remember the likes of West Ham, Norwich, Southampton etc challenging for the league, Liverpool or us always tended to win it but it was never a forgone conclusion. Same with the FA Cup, any team could win and getting to the final was a rare and major occurence.

Standing on terraces would be a culture shock for a lot of people now. They were incredibly scary places yet also exhilarating.

The main difference for me though and the saddest change is the World Cup. Back then (my first one I can remember is 1986 in Mexico) it was a much more mystical event. Imagine if you had only seen the current Spain team for example play once or twice in your life. The build up to getting to see these mysterious foreigners was brilliant. Getting to see Brazil in 1982-86 with the likes of Zico and Socrates it was like watching football from a different planet. You had the Russians with their stern faces and their unique style, all nations had that then, a certain style they played with. And you got to see mad African teams with their bright kits where the keeper just wore a T Shirt and wrote his name on the back with a biro. One of the saddest realisations for me was when Angola qualified for the world cup a few years ago and a fair few of their players were playing in the likes of league one.

Commentators were proper commentators too. Not part time journalists trying to read into stuff whilst the match is still going on. Nothing beats hearing Bryan Moores voice booming down a grainy telephone line in Tbilisi whilst the crowd formed some kind of white noise in the background.

Im quite obsessed with teams who were massive back when I was a kid who barely exist these days. Teams like Carl Zeiss Jena, Dynamo Berlin, Dukla Prague, Red Star Belgrade etc.

The main difference though as I said is the fact that it was more unique. Football is generally the same world wide these days.

Bad Collin
July 9th, 2013, 4:36 AM
I don't remember much except that the teams were a lot more settled and we won all the time.

Only the cup finals stand out for me. I don't remember us sealing the title at any point but I remember the 1988 and 89 finals like they were yesterday. The last game of 89 too obviously :(

I was a deprived football child though, I didn't get taken to any games so that is probably why I only remember the big games on TV.

Beefy
July 9th, 2013, 5:29 AM
My abiding memory of the pre-Premier League era was one of the final weekends of the final Division One season. Leeds won the title when Man United failed to win on the penultimate day and that was the televised match that weekend (obviously only one game a week was on at that point).

At the end of the game they crossed over to some crappy semi-detached in Yorkshire where they had a live link-up with David Batty, Lee Chapman and Gary McAllister. They asked Batty what it was like to win the title and he just said "Aye, well it's a bonus 'int it?". Just brilliantly understated and such a contrast to the fireworks and pomp that greeted the first Sky-era Champions 12 months later.

Gary J
July 9th, 2013, 9:04 AM
I agree with MMH about the world cups I remember before Mexico 86 (still the greatest world cup) looking forward to finally being able to see such stars like Maradona , Francescoli , Zico , Platini as in those days you only get to see quick highlights on Football Focus or Saint and Greavesie.

I used to love watching the soccer six tournaments on Sportsnight too it was basically the masters tournament but with the current first team instead of retired pros and I remember John Durnin being particularly good for Liverpool. Also I remember seeing Liverpool destroy Forest 5-0 on Sportsnight in what is still probably the most complete performance I've seen from a team.

Bad Collin
July 9th, 2013, 9:08 AM
I've got that game on video somewhere - Barnes, Houghton and McMahon were immense.

Gary J
July 9th, 2013, 9:15 AM
John Barnes is the greatest player Liverpool have ever had in my lifetime. Gerrard wouldn't even make the top ten let alone be lauded as the greatest after Dalglish as i'm sure he will be when he calls it a day.

Gary J
July 9th, 2013, 9:16 AM
For the record I fucking hated Liverpool growing up in the same way people hate Man Utd these days. God I fucking laughed when Wayne Clarke ended their 30 game unbeaten run I soon stopped when I remembered it was Leeds who held the record.

Simon
July 9th, 2013, 9:52 AM
Is it not the case that, for the most part, people still don't see a huge amount of foreign football - it's just that A) people see enough to be able to bullshit their way to seeming 'knowledgeable', or B) the amount of written media there is around foreign football nowadays means people can just take on opinions from experts wholesale and pass them off as their own? The number of people who have confidently told me that Fernandinho is going to make a huge difference for City makes me very suspicious given that, in the vast majority of cases, they will at best have seen a handful of games against English opposition in the CL. Of course we do all see the likes of Barca and Madrid loads, and that means you get to see a lot of the world's best players, but every World Cup still showcases a shit-ton of players I've either never seen but have heard are great, or have never heard of but turn out to be great. Maybe I'm underestimating the average fan and am (even) more of an armchair fan than I realise, but even a player I've heard loads of over the past few years like Navas, I've not really seen enough of to develop a solid opinion of my own about him.

Gary J
July 9th, 2013, 10:30 AM
It's a lot easier now to see Foreign football I think ESPN show live Bundesliga , Serie A , Ligue 1 and Eredivise no wonder if they do what sky do and just show the same two times every week though.

Before 86 though we had barely seen anything of Maradona apart from a few clips here and there compare that to how much we see of Messi yes unknowns will come through but imagine just hearing about this player who scores shitloads for Barcelona and is up there as one of the greatest players you've ever seen and soon you are about to see him for the first time. That magic has gone these days.

Gary J
July 9th, 2013, 10:31 AM
I'm gonna watch Hero the documentary of the 86 world cup later now.

MMH
July 10th, 2013, 3:46 PM
Is it not the case that, for the most part, people still don't see a huge amount of foreign football - it's just that A) people see enough to be able to bullshit their way to seeming 'knowledgeable', or B) the amount of written media there is around foreign football nowadays means people can just take on opinions from experts wholesale and pass them off as their own? The number of people who have confidently told me that Fernandinho is going to make a huge difference for City makes me very suspicious given that, in the vast majority of cases, they will at best have seen a handful of games against English opposition in the CL. Of course we do all see the likes of Barca and Madrid loads, and that means you get to see a lot of the world's best players, but every World Cup still showcases a shit-ton of players I've either never seen but have heard are great, or have never heard of but turn out to be great. Maybe I'm underestimating the average fan and am (even) more of an armchair fan than I realise, but even a player I've heard loads of over the past few years like Navas, I've not really seen enough of to develop a solid opinion of my own about him.

Pretty much what Gary J said. The only way I got to watch the greats in the 80s was to tune into an obscure show on S4C called Sgorio. It as basically a welsh language european football show that had things ranging from Bernd Schuster dominating the Real Madrid midfield to Bangor City vs Barry Town in the Welsh premiership. Other than that it was only world cups or massive european games where you got to see the likes of Belanov, Hugo Sanchez, Emilio Butregueno and Jan Ceulemans. You knew about them and had the panini stickers etc but other than that it was a world of mystery where they gave you just enough to know who the greats were.